Ruary Mackenzie Dodds and his wife Kari de Koenigswarter are rated as Dragonfly Ambassadors by the British Dragonfly Society. Although they have recently been involved in the setting up of a Dragonfly Hotspot at Exbury Gardens in Hampshire, England, their work currently centres on New Zealand where awareness of the significance of dragonflies is possibly behind that of the U.K, which has a growing understanding that dragonflies are a key indicator of the health of waterspaces. In this talk, Ruary takes his listeners back to basics on the amazing life-cycle of these insects. He outlines typical preferred dragonfly habitats, and touches on identification of New Zealand species. In addition to Ruary’s talk, Kari’s larva demonstration table shows actual examples of the larval stages on NZ species.
In their New Zealand work, Ruary and Kari are carrying out survey work on behalf of the Greater Wellington Regional Council, and are preparing a dragonfly education pack for schools. They have also carried out five summer seasons of night-filming an endemic dragonfly species – the Bush Giant – that lives in a burrow! A Radio New Zealand Our Changing World programme has been devoted to their work. (https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/ourchangingworld/546925/dragonflies-masters-of-flight).
Ruary and Kari have been working with dragonflies since 1985. They opened Europe’s first Dragonfly Sanctuary in 1991, and founded the National Dragonfly Biomuseum in Northamptonshire in 1995. They and their team of volunteers continued work with the National Trust at Wicken Fen in Cambridgeshire, and were instrumental in the setting up of the Dragonfly Centre there in 2009. Their adventures were published in Ruary’s memoir, The Dragonfly Diaries (Saraband, 2014). Kari and Ruary have also published a how-to book, Dragonfly-Friendly Gardening (Saraband, 2024). Ruary is a Fellow of the Linnean Society. He has given talks in eight countries. He has appeared on both television and radio, and was awarded BBC Springwatch’s ‘Dragonfly Geek’ award. He has been featured in BBC Wildlife Magazine, The Scottish Field, and in Wildlife Trust and National Trust publications. Kari specializes in the larval stages of odonate life, while – even after over forty years – Ruary’s heart lifts at the sight of a dragonfly in flight, and he loves sharing this enthusiasm with his listeners!
Back to top anchor
Public talk